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M&S Wagyu - bother ye not

AJB Temple

AJB Temple

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M&S are doing Wagyu fillet, rump, rib & sirloin. It's very unusual for me to buy meat from supermarkets (we buy trade from farm), but Mrs AJBT wanted to try this with memories of Japan.

Don't bother. It is not even remotely close to even basic Japanese Wagyu quality. It's in the £80 a kilo area (typical retail for half decent beef down here) so a single steak (enough for 2 non greedy people) is around £19. M&S quality is usually good, but this is not a patch on the real thing.
 
There's just been a new Lidl's opened in Salisbury and I kid you not, 50m from Waitrose. All fresh fruit n'veg, inc a regular pot of pomegranate seeds, now from Lidl's at a third (roughly) the cost of Waitrose. Their wine is rubbish but Czech 'Budweiser' (the proper stuff) is about £1.80 a bottle and a 660ml bottle of Italian 'Peroni' is a full quid cheaper than 50m down the road- Rob
 
Fruit and veg fron LIDL et al is fine...if you're prepared to pop in every other day.
 
I'll second Roger's observation; so do most of the 8 members of my railway conservation sub-group. We all agree: "buy fruit & veg to use right away, preferably inside 24 hours". Blueberries are a notable exception to this.
 
Interesting. I buy hardly any fruit or veg from supermarkets, but my experience of Lidlaldi around Kent is often poor quality and very poor shelf life for fruit. If we don't get produce from the kitchen garden, it comes from the restaurant wholesaler mostly (delivered). The supply chain must be different from the supermarkets because the quality from the wholesaler is in a different league.
 
Rob, do you have a Costco near you?.I find their fresh produce excellent, and a cut above the high street outlets in quality, but you have to plan a little more carefully, as the quantities per pack are aimed at cafés and restaurants. Still 'doable' for small households though.
 
SamQ aka Ah! Q! said:
Rob, do you have a Costco near you?.I find their fresh produce excellent, and a cut above the high street outlets in quality, but you have to plan a little more carefully, as the quantities per pack are aimed at cafés and restaurants. Still 'doable' for small households though.
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Nearest Costco is Soton; 90 mile round trip so a bit far to go for a few tomatoes Sam:ROFLMAO: - Rob
 
Lidl offers are turned over on Thursday. I always shop on Thursday morning and they are often putting out the freshly arrived boxes of fruit and veg, many are noticeably cooler. Never had problems with them.
I suspect that many of the boxes languish on the high ambient shop floor for the rest of the week
 
Has anyone been to a Whole Foods in the UK? The US stores are great for fruit & veg (or were before the Amazon acquisition anyway). Only just realised there are shops in the UK. Never heard anyone mention them.
 
Woodbloke said:
Nearest Costco is Soton; 90 mile round trip so a bit far to go for a few tomatoes Sam:ROFLMAO: - Rob
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Yeah no good if it's not close but Sam is right, the quality is excellent though we don't buy much there because of the pack quantities.

We eat a lot of fruit and the general quality from the supermarkets has declined noticeably in the last few years, probably since Covid I think. We buy from Aldi, Lidl, M&S and Morrisons which are the supermarkets accessible to us plus some from the market stall at the local garden centre and it varies wildly and certainly doesn't keep the way it used to.

Unfortunately most of us poor Joe public don't have access to wholesale suppliers so need to buy where we can.
 
Lons said:
Unfortunately most of us poor Joe public don't have access to wholesale suppliers so need to buy where we can.
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Fully understand that, but we obviously buy in quantity: so 25kg sacks of Agria /Koffman, 25kg sacks of Shipton, trays of tomatoes, mushrooms etc, 10kg bags of shallotts etc. I think we have lost out with the supermarkets taking over from proper greengrocers, fishmongers and butchers. We've nationally traded quality for convenience.

We're catering a wedding today (started at 6am) so I am on coffee break. :)
 
AJB Temple said:
Fully understand that, but we obviously buy in quantity: so 25kg sacks of Agria /Koffman, 25kg sacks of Shipton, trays of tomatoes, mushrooms etc, 10kg bags of shallotts etc. I think we have lost out with the supermarkets taking over from proper greengrocers, fishmongers and butchers. We've nationally traded quality for convenience.

We're catering a wedding today (started at 6am) so I am on coffee break. :)
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Yes but my point was that buying wholesale doesn't apply to the vast majority of people and most likely very few if any other members posting on this thread. who have to buy retail.
 
AJB Temple said:
M&S are doing Wagyu fillet, rump, rib & sirloin. It's very unusual for me to buy meat from supermarkets (we buy trade from farm), but Mrs AJBT wanted to try this with memories of Japan.

Don't bother. It is not even remotely close to even basic Japanese Wagyu quality. It's in the £80 a kilo area (typical retail for half decent beef down here) so a single steak (enough for 2 non greedy people) is around £19. M&S quality is usually good, but this is not a patch on the real thing.
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In farming, we’d call them Wagyu cross. Imported, 100% Wagyu bull semen used to inseminate an Angus cow in the UK, for example, which satisfies the 50% rule for labelling them.

How were they ‘aged’? Seems to bit a bit of a minefield these days. I recently went to a Miller and Carter steakhouse in Aberdeen, which claimed 50-day aged steaks. Ok, but no way were they hung for 50 days. I assume the ageing involved a short hanging, then a vac-pack in the fridge.

A by-product of the “British Wagyu” steak market is the Costco Wagyu burger. Very nice indeed.
 
Guineafowl21 said:
How were they ‘aged’? Seems to bit a bit of a minefield these days. I recently went to a Miller and Carter steakhouse in Aberdeen, which claimed 50-day aged steaks. Ok, but no way were they hung for 50 days. I assume the ageing involved a short hanging, then a vac-pack in the fridge.

A by-product of the “British Wagyu” steak market is the Costco Wagyu burger. Very nice indeed.
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Ignore anything saying aged unless it is dry aged. The whole point is moisture loss, which is impossible in plastic. We have a dry ageing cabinet now and take dry aged 45 day beef I get from the farmer, to 70 days in the unit. Weight loss pushes the price per kg up of course.

In my view ( clearly not yours ;)) wagyu burger is pointless and just a marketing ploy. The whole idea of good grade wagyu is that the meat is very marbled - this is what makes it melt in the mouth. When you mince it up, it's not really any different to any decent beef with fat added as it goes through the mincer. Clearly the cattle used for Wagyu need to maximise yield, hence mince for burgers etc, but I have never been convinced that wagyu mince and burgers are worth the premium price.
 
Ah, rather like little Lord Fauntleroy, I had no idea of the price - the wife usually brings a tray back on her occasional trips to Aberdeen. Looks to be about £1.87 per 170g burger. Quite a bit, and a way of using up the non-steak parts of the bullock, I guess. They are nice, fatty burgers.

I usually make my own, but have to hunt high and low for 20%-fat mince. The cholesterol hysteria of decades ago has left us with miserable 5% stuff, to which I have to add suet to make vaguely palatable.
 
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